This chapter brings us back to the beginning of atomic theory and study in order to for us to better understand how scientists came up with the a-tom. The a-tom is indivisible, invisible and is the smallest unit of matter.
Leon Lederman uses an analogy that more or less got me hooked on the book in the first place. Soccer season has just started, a few practices have gone by, and I'm not looking forward to reading a physics book that could potentially bore me to death due to my procrastinating ways. I read a few pages of the first chapter (titled: The Invisible Soccer Ball) and decided that i could really get a good understanding of how these physicists thought.
The analogy relates to a game of soccer. The point was to imagine an alien race that is unable to see objects with sharp juxtapositions of black and white (soccer balls) trying to watch a soccer game. They would be trying to use a variety of techniques (some quite complicated) in order to understand the game and enjoy watching it like the mojority of humans do. All of the reults make sense to them, but we know that they are wrong. The idea of an invisible ball is raised among these aliens. Ivisible?? The fact of the matter is that its true. The only thing that truly makes sense in the most simplistic way, yet most unbelievable, is the existense of an invisible ball.
The a-tom is our "invisible ball". It is the only thing that truly makes sense. This analogy is the basis of this book. Without the understanding that, sometimes, guesses have to be made in order for things to make sense, we cannot unlock the mysteries of our universe.
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